'Ada! To nie wypada!' was screened for me by a native Pole, who was kind enough to translate some of the dialogue and jokes for me. IMDb's description of this film (as a comedy) is not quite accurate: the film *is* light-hearted, and some of it is quite funny, but there is far more emphasis on singing and dancing than on humour, so I would classify this film as a musical ... though it's a funny one, not a serious one. Also, I disagree with IMDb's synopsis which describes the heroine as a 'tomboy': she's a free-spirited hellion of the Betty Hutton type, but not very hoydenish with it.
The movie's title translates as 'Ada! That's not polite!' which is also the title of the best and most prominent song in this film's score.
I hope I've spelt all these names properly. Here goes: Ada Dziewanowski (Loda Niemirzanka) comes from a respectable and wealthy family, but she is outgoing and impulsive, instead of being the subdued 'lady-like' type that her widower father (Antoni Fertner) feels she should be. Her father has chosen a husband for her: Frederick (Alexander Zabcynski), the handsome young son of a baron. But Ada's father insists that she must learn proper behaviour before getting married. So, he sends her off to a very strict finishing school.
As luck would have it, the school's music teacher (Casimir Krukowski) has written a full-blown operetta. This is Ada's cue to go into Little Miss Fix-It mode. She squeezes enough kopecks out of her father's exchequer to mount a full-scale production of the operetta, performed by her talented friends from the school. This movie's scriptwriter wants to make sure there's no possible doubt in our minds that our heroine's motives are unselfish, so Ada doesn't cast herself in the lead role: that part goes to the much older Eira Roletti, who is such a flaming bitch that it's obvious she's not going to make it to opening night.
SPOILERS COMING: This whole movie is froth, so the ending meets all the audience's expectations. At the last minute on opening night, Eira can't go on, so Ada (for everybody else's sake, of course) is forced to step into the starring role. The show is of course a huge hit, and all ends happily. I was hoping that Freddy would refuse to marry Ada on the grounds that she's a common vulgar actress (ugh!), but I guess he was too busy counting her father's money.
'Ada! That's not polite!' never attempts to be anything more than entertainment. It's more successful than I'd expected it to be, and the photography (especially in the crowd scenes and chorus numbers) is better than I'd hoped. It's nice to know that people in Poland in 1936 could still divert themselves with froth like this. In the closing number, I could hear jackboots approaching from stage left (Germany) *and* from stage right (Russia). I'll rate this 7 out of 10.
The movie's title translates as 'Ada! That's not polite!' which is also the title of the best and most prominent song in this film's score.
I hope I've spelt all these names properly. Here goes: Ada Dziewanowski (Loda Niemirzanka) comes from a respectable and wealthy family, but she is outgoing and impulsive, instead of being the subdued 'lady-like' type that her widower father (Antoni Fertner) feels she should be. Her father has chosen a husband for her: Frederick (Alexander Zabcynski), the handsome young son of a baron. But Ada's father insists that she must learn proper behaviour before getting married. So, he sends her off to a very strict finishing school.
As luck would have it, the school's music teacher (Casimir Krukowski) has written a full-blown operetta. This is Ada's cue to go into Little Miss Fix-It mode. She squeezes enough kopecks out of her father's exchequer to mount a full-scale production of the operetta, performed by her talented friends from the school. This movie's scriptwriter wants to make sure there's no possible doubt in our minds that our heroine's motives are unselfish, so Ada doesn't cast herself in the lead role: that part goes to the much older Eira Roletti, who is such a flaming bitch that it's obvious she's not going to make it to opening night.
SPOILERS COMING: This whole movie is froth, so the ending meets all the audience's expectations. At the last minute on opening night, Eira can't go on, so Ada (for everybody else's sake, of course) is forced to step into the starring role. The show is of course a huge hit, and all ends happily. I was hoping that Freddy would refuse to marry Ada on the grounds that she's a common vulgar actress (ugh!), but I guess he was too busy counting her father's money.
'Ada! That's not polite!' never attempts to be anything more than entertainment. It's more successful than I'd expected it to be, and the photography (especially in the crowd scenes and chorus numbers) is better than I'd hoped. It's nice to know that people in Poland in 1936 could still divert themselves with froth like this. In the closing number, I could hear jackboots approaching from stage left (Germany) *and* from stage right (Russia). I'll rate this 7 out of 10.
